


_ 

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR 
UNITED STATES GEOLOGICAL SURVEY 

GEORGE OTIS SMITH, Director 

Water-Supply Paper 345— B 



GROUND WATER FOR IRRIGATION IN THE 
VICINITY OF ENID, OKLAHOMA 

BY 

A. T. SCHWENNESEN 

WITH A NOTE ON 

GROUND WATER FOR IRRIGATION ON THE 
GREAT PLAINS 

By O. E. MEINZER 



Contributions to the Hydrology of the United States, 1914 — B 




Monograph 



WASHINGTON 

GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 

1914 



DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR 

UNITED STATES GEOLOGICAL SURVEY 

GEORGE OTIS SMITH, DIRECTOR 



Water-Supply Paper 345— B 



GROUND WATER FOR IRRIGATION IN THE 
VICINITY OF ENID, OKLAHOMA 

BY 

A. T. SCHWENNESEN 

WITH A NOTE OX 

GROUND WATER FOR IRRIGATION ON THE 
GREAT PLAINS 

By O. E. MEINZER 



Contributions to the Hydrology of the United States, 1914 — B 




WASHINGTON 

GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 

1914 



7 V 






CONTENTS. 



Page. 

Introduction 11 

Geologic outline 12 

Water in the Carboniferous ' ' Red Beds " 12 

Water in the Tertiary and later deposits 14 

Irrigation 16 

Records of typical wells 19 

Note on ground water for irrigation on the Great Plains, by 0. E. Meinzer 21 



ILLUSTRATION. 



Plate I. Map of the vicinity of Enid, Okla., showing ground-water conditions. 12 
u 

34780°— 14 



GROUND WATER FOR IRRIGATION IN THE VICINITY OF 
ENID, OKLAHOMA. 



By A. T. Schwennesen. 



INTRODUCTION. 

Enid, the county seat of Garfield County, Okla., is situated in the 
north-central part of the State, in the Cimarron River drainage basin, 
near the divide between this basin and that of the Salt Fork of the 
Arkansas. The region has the gently undulating surface character- 
istic of much of the western prairie country. 

In 1910 Enid had a population of 13,799. It is the center of a 
prosperous farming community and is favored with excellent rail- 
road facilities. The principal crops in this vicinity are wheat, In- 
dian corn, Kafir corn, and Milo maize. Potatoes, peanuts, melons, 
apples, garden truck, and small fruits are also raised. 

The average annual precipitation at Enid for the nine years prior 
to 1913 was 32.48 inches. During the season of 1912-13 this 
region was affected by the drought that prevailed throughout the 
West and Middle West and the rainfall was only 18.28 inches. This 
condition naturally suggested the idea of supplying the deficiency in 
rainfall by artificial means. As no surface water seemed to be avail- 
able for this purpose, knowledge of what had been accomplished in 
other parts of the West by the utilization of ground water for irriga- 
tion directed attention to this as a possible source. As ideas of the 
quantity and occurrence of the available ground-water supply were 
rather vague, it was thought desirable to obtain some reliable data as 
to the extent and character of the water-bearing beds before extensive 
pumping irrigation was advocated. Correspondence was therefore 
entered into with the United States Geological Survey, urging that a 
ground-water survey of the region be made. Unfortunately circum- 
stances would not permit the making of a complete survey at this 
time, and the writer, to whom the investigation was assigned, was 
able to spend only a few days in the field. In the preparation of this 
report Water-Supply Paper 148, entitled "Geology and water resources 
of Oklahoma," by C. N. Gould, was freely consulted. The data in re- 
gard to pumping tests at Oklahoma City have been taken from the 
report of Hiram Phillips, John W. Alvord, and J. W. Billingsley^ 
members of the board of engineers engaged to plan a water-supply 
system for that city. 

34780°— 14 11 



12 CONTRIBUTIONS TO HYDROLOGY OF UNITED STATES, 1914. 
GEOLOGIC OUTLINE. 

Rocks of Carboniferous age, known as the " Red Beds/' cover large 
areas in central and western Oklahoma. They consist principally 
of brick-red shales locally called "red keel" but include some thin 
layers of interbedded sandstones. They dip 10 to 20 feet to the mile 
toward the west and southwest and are shown by deep-well sections 
to be of great thickness. A well which is being drilled by the city of 
Enid 2 miles north of town, in the NW. } sec. 29, North Enid Town- 
ship, penetrated over 2,000 feet of red shale, and two wells drilled at 
El Reno, Canadian County, Okla., 60 miles south of Enid, were in the 
"Red Beds" for 1,700 and 3,300 feet, respectively. 

In some parts of the State the "Red Beds" are covered by a thin 
blanket of unconsolidated clays, sands, and gravels, which are geolog- 
ically much younger and probably belong to the Tertiary system. 
These deposits occur in the region about Enid, covering the area 
approximately shown by the shading on Plate I. At one time Ter- 
tiary deposits of this kind probably covered the entire western part 
of the State, but much of this material has been removed by erosion, 
and in central Oklahoma remnants are left only on some of the inter- 
stream areas. Even in these areas streams have worn through the 
Tertiary deposits into the underlying "Red Beds," as along Skeleton 
Creek just south of Enid, where the "Red Beds" are exposed across 
the whole width of the valley. In some places these valleys have 
been partly refilled by stream deposits, as along Turkey Creek 7 
miles southwest of Enid. 

The Tertiary deposits in the vicinity of Enid range from a thin 
layer to beds 60 feet thick. In wells sunk into these deposits three 
classes of material can generally be distinguished — first, a layer of 
soil, varying in different localities from sand to heavy clay or "gumbo," 
depending upon the character of the underlying material from which 
it has been derived; second, a layer of yellow, reddish, or bluish clay, 
more or less sandy in different places and grading into the overlying 
soil; and third, material composed of well-rounded quartz fragments, 
varying from quicksand to fine gravel, usually coarsest near the bot- 
tom. Underlying this is the red shale, or "keel," which forms the 
bedrock in this whole region. 

WATER IN THE CARBONIFEROUS "RED BEDS." 

In the agricultural district around Enid many of the domestic wells 
derive water from the "Red Beds." These red-bed wells are all 
shallow and tap the water-bearing sandstones interbedded with the 
predominating red shale. In most places one or more water-bearing 
sandstone beds may be reached by drilling less than 100 feet, but 
the driller of the deep municipal test well north of Enid reported that 
below the first 48 feet of Tertiary deposits, of which 20 feet was soil 



U. S. GEOLOGICAL SURVEY 
R.8W. 




R.8W. 



MAP OF 



LEGEND 




Deposits of clay, sand, and gravel of Tertiary and 
later age. Boundaries were determined by a rapid 
reconnaissance and are only approximate. Small 
bodies of these deposits which were not mapped also 
occur in the unshaded area. Wells in the shaded 
area will, as a rule, yield sufficient water for small 
irrigating projects 




Wells drawing their water supply from sands and 

gravel of Tertiary or later age. Numbers correspond 

to those of the table in the text 




^ Wells drawing their water supply from the Car- 

~- bonif erous "RedBeds" (locally known as "red keel"). 

Numbers correspond to those of the table in the text 



U. S. GEOLOGICAL SURVEY 



WATER-SUPPLY PAPER 345 PLATE 
R.5W. 




MAP OF THE VICINITY OF ENID, OKLA., SHOWING GROUND-WATER CONDITIONS. 



GROUND WATEE NEAR ENID, OKLA. 13 

and 28 feet coarse water-bearing sand, no more water-bearing beds 
were found in a total thickness of more than 2,000 feet of red shale. 
At a depth of 2,145 feet the drill penetrated a thin bed of red sand- 
stone containing salt water, below which 30 feet of "limestone" was 
reported. Deep borings in other parts of the country show that the 
sandstone beds are lenticular and not continuous for any considerable 
distance, so that a water-bearing bed which is present in one well may 
be entirely lacking in another well not far away. For this reason 
the scarcity of water-bearing beds shown by the Enid well log must 
not be taken as representative of the whole region, and in the average 
well the conditions will usually be better. Several shallow bored 
wells in the "Red Beds" along Skeleton Creek south of town flow at 
certain times of the year. The occurrence is not of economic impor- 
tance but nevertheless is of considerable interest. The discharge 
from these wells is small and with one exception they flow only 
during the rainy season. One well on the farm of J. A. Henry, in the 
SE. J sec. 1, Hackberry Township, flows continuously at the rate of 
about 8 gallons a minute. The well is 40 feet deep and the water 
rises in the casing 3J feet above the ground. The strong taste and 
the white crust that it forms on evaporation show that this water is 
heavily charged with mineral matter. The shallow depth of the 
wells, the low artesian head, and the coincidence of the period of flow 
with the rainy season show that the source of the artesian water is 
not very far away. As the prevailing dip of the rocks is toward the 
southwest, the porous bed tapped by the wells probably appears at 
the surface somewhere at a higher elevation not far northeast and 
obtains its supply solely from rain that percolates into the outcrop. 

No data are available on the maximum yield to be expected from 
wells in the ''Red Beds" in this particular region, but some pumping 
tests made at Oklahoma City, 75 miles south of Enid, by the board of 
engineers employed to plan a water s} T stem for that city, are instruc- 
tive. Pumping tests were made on 14 of the largest and most pro- 
ductive wells in or near Oklahoma City. They are bored wells, 6 to 
10 inches in diameter and 217 to 256 feet deep. The greatest recorded 
yield from any of them was 175 gallons a minute in a continuous 
24-hour test. Before the test the water level stood 47 feet below the 
top of the casing and during the greater part of the test 180 feet 
below, showing a drawdown of 133 feet. The well therefore yielded 
about 1.3 gallons a minute for each foot of drawdown. The greatest 
yield per foot of drawdown from the wells tested was 1.8 gallons a 
minute and the lowest 0.65 gallon. This shows that the depth from 
which the water must be lifted and consequently the unit cost of the 
water increases very rapidly with the duty demanded of the wells. 

Analyses of red-bed waters from different parts of the State show 
great differences in the amounts of dissolved mineral matter, even 



14 CONTRIBUTIONS TO HYDROLOGY OF UNITED STATES, 1914. 

where the samples were taken from wells very near each other. Gould 
makes a comparison of analyses of water from eight red-bed wells 
located within a radius of two blocks in the city of Norman, which he 
considers typical of wells supplied from the "Red Beds." l In these 
waters the total dissolved solids range from 572 to 4,365 parts per 
million and there is a corresponding range in the quantities of the 
various salts. The fact that the wells were all shallow, ranging in 
depth from 23 to 50 feet, and drew their supplies from rocks at the 
same geologic horizon makes the great variation in quality of water 
all the more remarkable. The more highly mineralized red-bed 
waters are unsatisfactory for irrigation, but many of the waters from 
the "Red Beds" can be used without injury to plant growth. More 
highly mineralized water can safely be used in the vicinity of Enid 
than in regions that are less well drained and receive less precipitation. 
Water that does not have a salty taste will usually be found safe for 
irrigation . 

WATER IN THE TERTIARY AND I.ATER DEPOSITS. 

Practically all the water used for domestic and industrial supplies 
in Enid is obtained from wells sunk in the Tertiary sands and gravels 
overlying the "red keel." These sands and gravels differ in thickness 
at different places, but they seem to be fairly continuous and a boring 
seldom fails to find them. 

Dug, bored, and driven wells are commonly used. Most of the 
bored and driven wells are sunk to the "red keel" and their casings 
are perforated at the water stratum. Where large amounts of water 
are used a system of several driven wells connected to a common suc- 
tion main has usually been found most satisfactory. Some single 
wells, however, produce large yields; the large dug well of the Atchi- 
son, Topeka & Santa Fe Railway Co. supplies many locomotives daily, 
and the combination dug and bored well on the ranch of Charles King, 
2 miles southwest of the city, furnishes plenty of water for irrigation. 

The largest pumping plant in Enid using driven wells is at the city 
waterworks. Considerable forethought was exercised in planning 
this well system. Before a site for the plant was chosen 10 test wells 
were put down to the "red keel" to determine the thickness and char- 
acter of the water-bearing beds. The line of wells was about 2 miles 
long and extended northeastward from the center of the SE. \ sec. 11, 
Garland Township. Several test wells were then bored 25 feet apart 
where the water-bearing sands were found to be thickest. One of 
these wells was pumped continuously to capacity for 48 hours and 
the drawdown in it and the other wells was noted. As the water 
table was not appreciably lowered beyond a radius of 27 feet from 



1 Gould, C. N., Geology and water resources of Oklahoma: U. S. Geol. Survey Water-Supply Paper 
148, pp. 142-145, 1905. 



GROUND WATER NEAR ENID, OKLA. 15 

the pumped well that distance was adopted as the proper spacing for 
the wells in the proposed system. 

The system which was planned as a result of these experiments and 
is now in use consists of a circular pump pit with two drifts or ' ' tun- 
nels" extending in opposite directions from the bottom of the pit, 
with sand points driven from the floor of the drifts through the water- 
bearing sands to the "red keel." The pit is 28 feet in diameter and 
31 feet deep. Each drift is 400 feet long and has sixteen 4-inch drive 
points 27 feet apart, fitted with Cook screens. The points in each 
tunnel are connected to a common suction main and fitted with valves 
so that any one of the points may be cut out. The pumps are oper- 
ated by steam and have an average daily capacity of 1,000,000 to 
1,500,000 gallons. A generalized log of this entire group of wells is 
given in the table of well records (No. 35). 

A similar system used by the Arctic Ice & Refrigerating Co. con- 
sists of sixty 2-inch Cook sand points driven to the "red keel" from 
the bottom of two trenches, each 60 feet long, 12 feet wide, and 16 feet 
deep, set at right angles to each other. An electrically operated 
pump on a level with the bottom of the trenches is connected with 
the wells through a common suction main. This pump is often 
operated continuously for 24 hours at the rate of 200 gallons a minute 
without appreciably weakening the supply. 

Where large drafts are made on ground waters by pumping they 
must be replenished from time to time or the total available supply 
will soon be exhausted. This addition to the ground water may be 
made by local rainfall or by underground percolation from other 
areaSo At Enid the sands that contain the water are underlain by 
nearly impervious reel shale, along whose surface the ground water 
moves. The drainage of the region shows that the red-bed surface 
slopes away from Enid in all directions except toward the northwest, 
and consequently that is the only direction from which the Tertiary 
sands could receive water by percolation from outside areas. Even 
northwest of the city, however, the Tertiary deposits are considerably 
dissected, making it improbable that there is much underflow into the 
Enid area from that direction. Where the soil is a heavy gumbo 
much of the rain is shed into the streams, but where the soil and 
subsoil are sandy a large part of the rain percolates to the ground- 
water level. Much of the Enid area is practically level and the soil 
is on the whole absorptive enough to prevent much run-off, so that 
the local rainfall is without question the chief factor in replenishing 
the ground-water supply of the Tertiary sands and gravels. 

The well waters from the Tertiary deposits are generally of good 
quality. An analysis of water from one of the test wells put down 
by the city is given below. The analysis originally reported in 
hypothetical combinations in grams per gallon has been converted 
into ionic form in parts per million. 



16 CONTRIBUTIONS TO HYDROLOGY OF UNITED STATES, 1914. 

Analysis of water from a test well at the waterworks, Enid, Okla. 
[Parts per million.] 

Calcium (Ca) 82 

Magnesium (Mg) 27 

Sodium and potassium (Na+K) 41 

Bicarbonate radicle (HC0 3 ) 320 

Sulphate radicle (S0 4 ) 58 

Chlorine (CI) 56 

Total dissolved solids 418 

This analysis represents a moderately mineralized calcium- 
carbonate water. The hardness of the water, about 320 parts per 
million, is rather high, and such a supply would have to be "broken" 
or softened for use in laundry work. It carries about 300 parts per 
million of scale-forming matter but probably would not cause foam- 
ing or be corrosive in boilers. It is satisfactory for irrigation. 

IRRIGATION. 

To be readily irrigable land must be nearly level and its surface 
must be comparatively smooth. Many of the minor irregularities 
can be removed by grading, but where there are numerous large 
gullies and the broader undulations of the ground are too pronounced 
the cost of leveling would be prohibitive. Around Enid some large 
tracts could be prepared for irrigation at small cost and some parts 
of almost any farm are irrigable. 

The success of an irrigation project in this vicinity depends largely 
on the cost of pumping. This expense is more complex than it seems 
and includes items that are too often neglected in making estimates 
of the cost of pumping. Besides the actual operating expenses, 
which include attendance, repairs, and the cost of power, it includes 
several fixed charges, such as interest on the investment and depre- 
ciation. The fixed charges go on whether the plant is running or not, 
but the operating expenses are incurred only while the plant is in 
actual use. The cost of power, which is ordinarily the largest item 
of the running expenses, is proportional to the depth from which 
water must be pumped, and beyond certain limits of depth it does not 
pay to pump water. These limits vary in different regions, depending 
chiefly on the cost of power and the value of the crops. In some 
regions, as in the orange country of southern California, it pays to 
pump water from depths which would be out of question in less 
favored regions. 

In the Enid area the cost of developing and pumping water from 
the "Red Beds" will be much greater than the cost of developing 
and pumping from the Tertiary or younger sands and gravels. 

The results of the pumping tests at Oklahoma City show that the 
yield from individual wells in the "Red Beds" is not large, the most 



GROUND WATER NEAR ENID, OKLA. 17 

productive well of the group yielding only 1.8 gallons of water per 
foot of drawdown. The cost for power increases with every addi- 
tional foot of drawdown, so that to avoid pumping from depths 
beyond the economical limit and still get an irrigating stream large 
enough to cover the ground quickly and evenly, means of storage 
would have to -be provided. Earth reservoirs built out of the "red 
keel" of this region would be well suited for this purpose. An effi- 
cient pumping system, to furnish even a moderate amount of water 
under these conditions, would be expensive, so that the interest on 
the initial cost of the plant and depreciation added to the cost of 
power for pumping from deep wells makes the final cost per acre-foot 
of water pumped so high that the use of water from the "Red Beds" 
should not be recommended unless no other supply is available, and 
then only for certain intensive crops, such as fruit or garden truck, 
where the financial return per acre would warrant a heavy expense 
for pumping. 

On the other hand, the water in the Tertiary and alluvial deposits, 
represented by the shaded area on the accompanying map (PL I), is 
easily obtained at a low cost for pumping almost anywhere in tins 
area in quantities sufficient for irrigation. The supply from the Ter- 
tiary and alluvial deposits is by no means inexhaustible, but moderate 
drafts on the supply during the comparatively short season in winch 
irrigation is necessary will be compensated by local rainfall throughout 
the year. 

In the Tertiary deposits and in the later alluvial deposits along 
some of the streams the water is so near the surface that a group of 
wells could be operated from a single pumping plant. Either driven 
or bored wells connected to a common suction main could be used. 
Such a system is very flexible and the extent to which it can be en- 
larged by adding new wells as the requirements demand is limited 
only by the capacity of the pumps. 

As the water-bearing material underlying the Enid area is mostly 
sand and few of the wells show gravel, it is thought that a certain 
type of well, which has been called the "gravel-wall well" and which 
has been successfully used in other regions, would be suitable 
here. In wells of this type the perforated casing or screen is sur- 
rounded by a thick shell of gravel or crushed rock, which separates 
it from the surrounding water-bearing sand. The method of con- 
struction is as follows: A large casing is first sunk from the surface 
of the ground into the water-bearing sand; sand is then removed 
through this casing with a sand bucket or a centrifugal pump; as 
material is removed from the bottom more caves in from the sides 
until a large cavity is formed; a smaller casing with many large per- 
forations or fitted with a coarse screen is then let down inside of the 



18 CONTRIBUTIONS TO HYDROLOGY OF UNITED STATES, 1914. 

first casing to the bottom, of the cavity, and, clean gravel or crushed 
rock is dumped down the intervening space between the outer and 
inner casings until the cavity is filled. The outer casing may then 
be pulled up to the top of the water-bearing sand or pulled out 
entirely and used over again for some other well. The advantage 
of a well of this kind over the ordinary, bored well lies in the fact that a 
much coarser screen can be used on the casing than would ordinarily 
be possible where the water occurs in sand. 

A well involving these principles has been successfully used for a 
number of years on the farm of Charles King, in the SW. J sec. 11, 
Garland Township. Being the only irrigating pumping plant in this 
region worthy of mention, it warrants a brief description. The well 
consists of a circular pump pit extending to the water level 22 feet 
below the surface, with a 24-inch perforated casing sunk to the "red 
keel" and surrounded by a shell of gravel. A 3J-mch Gould cen- 
trifugal pump, capable of delivering about 300 gallons a minute and 
belted to an 8-horsepower Fairbanks-Morse gasoline engine, is set 
in the pit at water level. Mr. King irrigates 15 acres of apple orchard 
in addition to several acres of small fruits and general garden truck. 
The centers between the rows are flooded and for the orchard four 
waterings a season are found to be sufficient. Each watering requires 
four or five days with the pump running 18 hours a day. 

The investment in the pumping plant has been found to be very 
profitable, because irrigation greatly increases the yield from the trees 
in normal years and prevents crop failure in years of drought. Mr. 
King estimates the total cost of the plant, including the well, at $500. 
In this case the engine was bought second hand, and the cost of labor 
for digging the well and installing the machinery was probably not 
taken into account, so that the ordinary cost of plants of this kind 
would be considerably more. 

The available supply of water in the Tertiary and later alluvial 
sands and gravels in the Enid region is probably not sufficient for the 
heavy irrigation of large tracts but is large enough for the irrigation 
of many small tracts distributed over the area. The raising of irri- 
gated crops in connection with the regular field crops should be encour- 
aged, as it will help to tide the farmer over financial crises when the 
ordinary crops fail. Alfalfa and certain kinds of fruits and vegeta- 
bles do well in the region around Enid, and if the ground water which 
is available is used conservatively and intelligently for the irrigation 
of these and perhaps some other crops it can be made to add greatly 
to the wealth of the community. 



GROUND WATER NEAR ENID, OKLA. 



19 



>S2 



CN 



£bT5X5 g 

S C3 w ws^ 

*o3 © a) h 

®d J2 £2 

8 fl 03 cS^ 
2 to O W 03 



03 03 03 03 o3 

ooooo 



111 

w p- 1 



bcbo 

•d-d 



^^ 

C3 03 

CO 



t-, i- o 
cs o3co 
o o- 



60 60 

-d-d 

ta a 

03 03 



1/5 US* 

COCN 



©*d 
a a 

t& 03 



03 I I >>0 
0,«N 1/5 _o3 03 

.. 03 T3 03 
02 02 



gj o o o o o o 

rj *d "O "d "d *d "d 



£2. 



on o 



'5c P 



.2* 
ax? 

O CD 

r 



i-i CD 
u CD 



:ct3 

O O CD O 
TSotf-d 



o "3 
■** > 

6® 
p. 

CD 

Q 



ccrtN -Or 



rid 
0"S 



00CC CN 1OC0 



-d = 

CD ' ' 

M 

O 

pq 



^2 

W C3 CD 



Q PQ 



Q ft 



« ft 



« *- G^-rt • . 03 H 

J cdSP2-S^M-« 

-J 8> . -So- . o 

H OpHoddd^o 



—I "^ 

^2 OS _ 

O «8 C - >-i 
oPm O CD 

W ^ ^^ 

o* ^» 

Sort's *S. 



§« : 

. .02 .-d 

q-d pd o 

02* W 02 <1 02 Ph 



b O, 



. «Ph02 • 
! &cd Ph 

K< 02 



OH 



«3 60 



M £6 

O CD 

B w-d 



aS 

O OS CD 

is S 3 
S-c) 



GO £ Z £ «i 02 02 02 £ 



£02 



02O202 £££ 0202 02 



^ 02 



1 

e -a 



O MiONMOJOWOl 
CN CNrt rH MCOCN 



:w 



M WW :pq 



05 >C 00 OlOO! 
rl CN CN MMH 



tH CN CO tJ< t^ 00 OS O CO 



20 CONTRIBUTIONS TO HYDROLOGY OF UNITED STATES, 1914. 



S T3 ■>« «-a 

^ c3 S o ca 

- 00 > CO 

C* u> a 






38 



ca,*! 



,o S 



O .33 .33 






CO Offl 



,i3 6.33 .33-" O 

O ceo effleo 



s 



>> : 

"ft : 
p< : 



53 5 '-3 



It 



£-2 



6=3 
OB CO 
ftfl 
09 O 



E M < 



CO to 



co ^2 
O C3 
'So £ 



D 
O". 

•«« 
a -a 
o ® o 

c3 : 

o 



c3 

B -a 



3- • 



o-. 



o o ® o 



.3 — Ph 



a 



o"3 



eg tuO 



?rs 



ft^ 



i» r- 00 O O 

£ -<j< oo »o«o 



^ 



3 6 

ft « 



^* o ® 



W 



>3 S 



S3 



DQ 

la 

q . 



. O cj C5 



d =5> 






ca sh 

co s 






00 H fH 



£ co £02 cocoZco co?!co Zco Z 



O O CO O M o o o 
AT) c3^^ 3 VOX} 



GROUND WATER NEAR ENID, OKLA. 21 

NOTE ON GROUND WATER FOR IRRIGATION ON THE 

GREAT PLAINS. 

By 0. E. Meinzer. 

The agricultural utilization of the vast area of Great Plains, with 
their fertile land but irregular rainfall, has long constituted a large 
and perplexing problem, and in spite of all the investigation and ex- 
perimentation that have been bestowed on this great region in the 
last few decades the problem is still largely unsolved. Series of wet 
years arouse the inhabitants to great optimism and lead to much 
apparent progress, but they are invariably followed by series of dry 
years that still have disastrous effects. No methods of agriculture 
have yet been developed that satisfactorily solve the problem, and 
there is still great need for irrigation. Even as far east as Enid, 
Okla., where the annual precipitation averages more than 30 inches, 
crops often suffer severely for want of water. Agriculture on the 
Great Plains will never be fully developed until all the available 
ground water is recovered and used in irrigation. 

There are two important sources of ground water on the Great 
Plains — the Dakota sandstone and the sands and gravels of late Ter- 
tiary and Quaternary age. In extensive areas in South Dakota, in 
the Arkansas Valley of Colorado, and in some other places the 
Dakota sandstone yields large quantities of artesian water, but over 
much of the southern part of the Great Plains this sandstone is absent 
and the Tertiary deposits rest on the Carboniferous "Red Beds," 
which are unpromising as a source of water for irrigation. The largest 
supply of water is found in the Tertiary and Quaternary sands and 
gravels that lie near the surface over an area of more than 100,000 
square miles of valley and plain in eastern Colorado and New Mexico 
and in western Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas. These beds 
do not as a rule yield flows. Ordinarily the water must be recovered 
by pumping. Pumping plants have been installed at some places, 
chiefly in the Arkansas Valley and in certain shallow-water belts in 
western Texas and adjacent parts of New Mexico, but many moro 
can be successfully operated. The solution of the problem of irriga- 
tion with water pumped from the Tertiary and Quaternary sands and 
gravels depends on (1) the cost of recovering the water and its value 
in producing crops and (2) the quantity of water available. 

Irrigation with pumped well water is always expensive, for to the 
cost of the ditches, of the land grading, and of applying the water 
must be added the cost of the wells, pumps, engines, connections, 
and pump house, of the fuel and lubricating oil, of the labor required 
in operating the plant, and of repairs and renewals for different parts 
of the plant from time to time. 

The cost of pumping a given quantity of water depends on the yield 
of the wells and the depth from which the water must be lifted, on 



22 CONTRIBUTIONS TO HYDROLOGY OF UNITED STATES, 1914. 

the kind of machinery and fuel used, and on other factors. It depends 
very largely on the adjustment of the pumps and engines to each other 
and to the work they have to do and on the working condition of all 
parts of the plant. Obviously pumping for irrigation is feasible only 
where ground water is readily available, where the equipment is suit- 
able and is intelligently managed, and where the water is put to good 
use through wise agricultural practice. 

Because of improvements in pumping machinery — especially in 
Internal-combustion engines — water can be pumped at less cost now 
than formerly, and because of improved methods of irrigation and 
agriculture and better adaptation of crops to water supply the value 
of pumped water has been increased. Hence pumping for irrigation 
is practicable to-day in localities where it was not practicable 10 or 
20 years ago. Moreover, progress in ground-water irrigation on the 
Great Plains must depend largely on mechanical improvements in 
pumping machinery and better adaptation of crops and cultural 
methods to this kind of water supply. With good management pump- 
ing for irrigation is now generally feasible where the water level 
stands within 25 or perhaps 50 feet of the surface and for the irrigation 
of vegetables and fruit where the depth to water is even greater. 

There has been much speculation as to the quantity of water that 
the Tertiary and Quaternary deposits of the Great Plains will yield, 
but little definite information on the subject has been obtained. On 
account of this general lack of knowledge there has been wide diver- 
gence of opinion, some persons assuming that the supply is inade- 
quate for any considerable amount of irrigation and others assum- 
ing, quite as unwisely, that the supply is inexhaustible. A thorough 
investigation is needed of the annual accretions to and discharges 
from these deposits in order that an estimate may be made of the 
quantity of water that is annually available for irrigation. 

The fact is well established that the supply does not come chiefly 
from the mountains, as is still popularly believed, but from the rain 
and snow that fall on the Great Plains. Where the soil is underlain 
by thick lime hardpan comparatively little of the rain reaches the 
ground water, but in the sandy areas percolation is greater. The 
fact that the source of supply is local is not unfavorable, as is sup- 
posed by many persons, but rather means that the intake area is 
extensive and that therefore the total supply is large, even though 
only a small part of the precipitation percolates to the ground-water 
level. If only 2 or 3 per cent of the precipitation on the Great Plains 
joins the ground water the supply is sufficient for the annual irriga- 
tion of a million acres. 

The water in any particular part of the region, however, must be 
used in that part and is not available for use in some distant area. 
The supply that can be utilized in any locality is thus limited, and the 



GROUND WATER NEAR ENID, OKLA. 23 

development of the entire region to its maximum capacity requires 
that the pumping plants be widely distributed over the shallow-water 
areas. 

Wherever in the semiarid parts of the Great Plains the ground 
water is near the surface, the soil good, and the yield of wells fairly 
copious, pumping plants for irrigation should be installed. In some 
areas a single well may yield several hundred gallons a minute; in 
other areas a group of wells may be required to produce this amount 
of water. A plant yielding 100 gallons a minute will irrigate 10 acres 
or more. If in any locality the ground-water conditions are found 
to be favorable and a number of pumping plants have been success- 
fully operated for some time, it may be desirable to consider the 
installation, for economy and convenience, of a central power plant 
with electric transmission lines leading to the individual pumping 
plants. On account of the irregularity of the sand and gravel 
deposits, however, no central power plant should be installed until 
the water supply for which it is intended has been fully tested by 
many wells. Moreover, on account of the lack of knowledge as to 
the rate at which the ground water is renewed great caution should 
obviously be exercised in installing expensive power plants. 

The Tertiary deposits in the vicinity of Enid, Okla., described by 
Mr. Schwennesen, form a small and nearly detached part of the wide- 
spread Tertiary water-bearing formation of the Great Plains and 
illustrate most of the statements that have been made in regard to 
the Great Plains in general. Thus, Mr. Schwennesen's investigation 
shows that the water supply in these deposits is derived chiefly by 
the percolation of the rain which falls in the vicinity, that although 
this supply is not large it is to some extent replenished by every 
heavy rainstorm, and that if it is withdrawn in moderate quantities 
for irrigation it will add materially to the agricultural production of 
the community. This investigation also shows the wisdom of thor- 
oughly testing irrigation on a small scale before making heavy expendi- 
tures for large power plants. 

O 



LIBRARY OF COWror^ 

M 



